This is first of many articles to come for "unbelieving mates" or UBM's. This may be a yawner for some of us old-timers, but I wanted to compile my experience in a set of easy-to-read articles for the beginner.
Description
"Cognitive dissonance is a state of opposition between cognitions. For the purpose of cognitive consistency theory, cognitions are defined as being an attitude, emotion, belief or value (Ford trucks built tough)... the theory of cognitive dissonance holds that contradicting cognitions (Ford trucks built tough, FORD stands for Fix Or Repair Daily) serve as a driving force that compels the human mind to acquire or invent new thoughts or beliefs, or to modify existing beliefs, so as to minimize the amount of dissonance (conflict) between cognitions."(Italics are my own thoughts, bolding added)Source, Wikipedia
Examples
Tedious peg-turning
"In Festinger and Carlsmith's classic 1959 experiment, students were made to perform tedious and meaningless tasks, consisting of turning pegs quarter-turns, then removing them from a board, then putting them back in, and so forth. Subjects rated these tasks very negatively. After a long period of doing this, students were told the experiment was over and they could leave.
However, the experimenter then asked the subject for a small favor. They were told that a needed research assistant was not able to make it to the experiment, and the subject was asked to fill in and try to persuade another subject (who was actually a confederate) that the dull, boring tasks the subject had just completed were actually interesting and engaging. Some subjects were paid $20 for the favor, another group was paid $1, and a control group was not requested to perform the favor.
When asked to rate the peg-turning tasks, those in the $1 group showed a much greater propensity to embellish in favor of the experiment when asked to lie about the tasks." Source, Wikipedia
Buy a Lemon
"Consider someone who buys an expensive car but discovers that it is not comfortable on long drives. Dissonance exists between their beliefs that they have bought a good car and that a good car should be comfortable. Dissonance could be eliminated by deciding that it does not matter since the car is mainly used for short trips (reducing the importance of the dissonant belief) or focusing on the cars strengths such as safety, appearance, handling (thereby adding more consonant beliefs). The dissonance could also be eliminated by getting rid of the car, but this behavior is a lot harder to achieve than changing beliefs." Source, Psycology.org
Women shopping for a coffee maker
"J. W. Brehm (1956) conducted the first experiment using the free- choice paradigm to test predictions derived from dissonance theory. In his experiment, which was presented as market research, he had women rate how desirable they found eight different products (e.g., toaster or coffeemaker) and then gave each of them a choice between two products that were close in desirability (difficult decision) or between two products that were not close in desirability (easy decision). After choosing which of the two products they would keep, the women rerated the desirability of the products. Results indicated that the women who made a difficult decision changed their evaluations of the products to be more positive about the chosen product and less positive about the rejected product. Spreading of alternatives was less for the women who made an easy decision. The free-choice paradigm continues to be used to gain insights into dissonance processes (e.g., Shultz & Lepper, 1996; Stone, chap. 8, this volume)." Source, APA.org
People Exhibit
- illogical loyalty towards their choice
- discomfort when challenged
- strongly defend their choice
- trivialize conflicting information
Key Features
Significant Effort
Are they willing to admit to wasting a significant amount of time and energy towards the wrong choice? The greater the investement, the greater the dissonance. The longer the person digs themselves in to a bad decision, the harder it becomes to leave.
Free Choice
The more difficult the decision (that is, there is a lot of similarity between the two choices) the stronger the dissonance.
Small Reward
When the reward is small enough, the participant seems to consider their choice to be a favour rather than an obligation. Perhaps people put more effort in to volunteer activities because the reward is intangibles such as "personal satisfaction".
How Jehovah's Witnesses Use Cognitive Dissonance
Significant Effort: A new convert is not baptised for at least six months. This way, the convert has invested a significant amount of time prior to baptism. The longer they spend studying, the more difficult it will be to back out. After baptism, the Jehovan's Witness lifestyle is an endless parade of study, meetings, and field service. This life requires a great deal of effort to maintain. Again, when a Jehovah's Witness who decides to leave must admit that they have wasted years of effort on an empty cause. Only the most brave and the humble have the strength to admit this.
Small Reward: The Jehovah's Witness reward is for a future promise of life forever on paradise earth. Watchtower articles frequently extol the rewards of the Jehovah's Witness life, but few concrete examples are given. This reinforces the dissonance, as the reader makes up their own reasons, later vehemently supporting them.
Positive Uses
Now that I understand the principles of Cognitive Dissonance, I've put the principles to work at the office. I have successfully implemented change across my team by offering small rewards and recognition. My team are energetic and dedicated to the cause, rather than the reward.
It dawned on me, too, that governments are not above using Cognitive Dissonance to implement unpopular changes. The GST was an unpopular new tax implemented across Canada. Considering the swath that it cut from Joe Citizen's pocketbook, however, the protests were relatively muted. Along with the GST tax, the government instituted a GST rebate that low income Canadians can apply for. I used to think that the huge administration required to process this rebate would have been better spent in lowering the tax overall. But now I realize that the rebate is "payoff money" to institute public Cognitive Dissonance and reduce resistance to the tax.
Coaxing Someone out of Cognitive Dissonance
My experience is that if I directly point out how illogical the person's choice they put up greater resistance. Here's a diagram of someone with an illogical belief.